First make sure that you understand, looking up unfamiliar words and other words that seem significant but unclear. • Paraphrase difficult lines or sections. Sometimes putting them in your own words makes the meaning clear. • Identify the poem’s theme or point. • Mark sound effects that emphasize ideas or feelings in the poem. • Is there rhyme or not? What effect does that have on your experience of the poem and its ideas? • On your third reading, jot down questions, comments, and thoughts. • After doing this careful reading with all three poems, list points of connection: similarities, contrasts, different approaches to a problem or theme, similar or different uses of poetic structure, sound, or figurative language. • Write a thesis statement that presents your position on an important relationship between your poems. • Select from your notes everything that will help you discuss that relationship. • Write a thesis statement and list or outline your topics and ideas. Here is an example: Thesis statement: Poem X and Poem Y contrast goodness and the amorality of Nature. Final Essay Assignment2 1) The nature of goodness in Poem X Analysis Quotation 1: goodness is innocence and gentleness, absence of evil. Quotation 2: our goodness comes from the example of Jesus and his sacrifice. Writer’s thoughts: humans can be good when they allow their souls to be saved by Jesus. However, people who are good may not necessarily be successful at competing in the world. 2) The absence of goodness in Nature in Poem Y Analysis Quotation 1: Nature is neither evil nor good; it is simply about survival. Quotation 2: In nature, power is what matters Quotation 3: Power in nature is both beautiful and terrifying. Writer’s thoughts: Creatures that are in a state of nature are awesome, but they lack souls and goodness. On the other hand, there is also no evil in nature. 3) What this contrast tells us about ourselves. We love opposing things, goodness and power (quotations). We are attracted to the beauty of power and might in Nature (quotation) However, these lead to death. Christianity promises eternal life; the weak die in nature, and there is no afterlife.
